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Reply-To:
From: "Ron D'Eau Claire"
To:
Subject: RE: [Elecraft] SSB - Fooie!
Date: Tue, 8 Oct 2002 18:20:50 -0700
John - KC4KGU wrote:
... If you just enjoy CW, that's one thing but, it's kinda hard to screw
up pulsing a carrier....
--------------------------------
Then why was it necessary to simplify the CW test so much over the years
in order for people to be able to pass it? And once learned... well...
I guess you haven't had the practice trying to copy some of the "fists"
that I have... Bless every one of them though for putting in the
effort that learn it takes to send well -even with the help of a
keyer.
You are right about there being more variables in SSB transmission -
starting with a 20 dB or more disadvantage in signal to noise ratio
compared to CW. And I'll add to that in support of your comment that
I've heard a few AWFUL sounding K2's out there on SSB. In general, the
BFO is not set right, producing a very bassy, muddy audio or a very
tinny "weak" audio. Figuring out how to properly adjust things is part
of the challenge and the fun of building your own rig. And it can't be
ignored any more than learning CW can be ignored if you want to use a
key.
I strongly recommend to any op running SSB to listen to yourself on an
auxiliary receiver at the first opportunity and record your voice to see
if you really like what you hear. Shoot, I've got probably a whole day
invested in "tweaking" the BFO settings and microphone for the best
audio and the only SSB QSO's I've had were with other K2 owners while I
was doing the tweaking!
Ron AC7AC
K2 # 1289
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Reply-To:
From: "Ron D'Eau Claire"
To:
Subject: RE: RE: [Elecraft] SSB - Fooie!
Date: Tue, 8 Oct 2002 19:48:54 -0700
Kevin, KD5ONS wrote
Don't knock a keyer :) It has helped me shape characters with my
straight key immensely. Just by hearing what 'good' code sounds like by
sending to myself for
many, many hours, making the transition to a straight key was fairly
painless. I found only 20 or 30 hours worth of work got me to the point
where I don't notice much difference between sending with one or the
other.
-------------------
I'd never do any such thing, Kevin. My apologies for sounding "grumpy" I
guess.
My Scotia Paddles may not get much use these days, but I've 20 years of
experience with an Iambic keyer. And with a keyboard -- but that was
hooked to the noisiest gawdawful bucket of bolts that you ever heard.
We called 'em a "Model 10 Teletypewriter" that demanded that you
synchronize your keystrokes with the machinery or those keys were going
to buck and refuse to send the characters you wanted. That was during my
stint as a MARS operator in the US Army in the 50's and in the RACES
circuit when I got out. My age is showing through the mask of cyberspace
again I see...
I was just listening on 40 CW to a couple of ops flying along at about
50 WPM - obviously on keyboards a bit more modern than the ol' RTTY and
sending code so clean that even I could lean back and copy it. It's fun
doing that. And "reading the mail" all over the bands and modes.
CW, SSB, PSK, RTTY, you name it. It's a great hobby. Let's all HELP each
other get the most fun out of it!
Ron AC7AC
K2 # 1289
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Date: Tue, 08 Oct 2002 23:37:23 -0500
From: "George, W5YR"
Organization: AT&T WorldNet Service
To: Larry East
Cc: Elecraft at mailman.qth.net
Subject: Re: [Elecraft] SSB - Fooie!
I don't know where the 20 dB advantage figure for CW over SSB comes from,
but both Larry and I were around during the early days of the AM/SSB wars.
A number of analysis papers were published in all the ham literature, but
as I recall the consensus was that sideband offered an overall 9 dB over
DSB AM in terms of S/N and some intangibles like power consumption, final
amplifier efficiency, etc.
I can see where CW would improve over SSB considering the use of, say, a
300 Hz bandwidth rather than 3000 Hz. That should be good for a factor of
10 or 10dB in S/N improvement, working on the back of an old envelope.
So I would tend to look upon CW as being probably 9-12 dB superior to SSB
in S/N, depending upon the bandwidths involved, but I don't think that I
could give it 20 dB.
Larry, what do you recall about all this? What am I forgetting about?
73/72, George
Amateur Radio W5YR - the Yellow Rose of Texas
In the 57th year and it just keeps getting better!
Fairview, TX 30 mi NE of Dallas in Collin county EM13qe
K2 #489 Icom IC-765 #2349 Icom IC-756 PRO #2121
Larry East wrote:
>
> At 08:51 PM 10/8/02 -0400, kc4kgu at ENTERZONE.NET wrote:
>
> >Larry, that's no attitude to have. If you just enjoy CW, that's one thing
> >but, it's kinda hard to screw up pulsing a carrier. There are a lot of
> >variables involved with SSB. Especially if it isn't a mode that you
> >operate much with on your rig, you may not have everything quite right and
> >the folks may not have heard you very well.
>
> Hogwash! I can have any attitude that I want at my age! :-)
>
> The biggest "variable" is that many SSB ops don't think any signal below S9
> is "good copy". I have been a ham now for 51 years and I have worked plenty
> of QRP DX -- most on CW but a bunch also on SSB. I have worked DX stations
> on both SSB and CW running 100W to 1KW that were rather week yet they were
> willing and able to hear my 5W. I've called stations state-side that were
> over S9 with no response. Maybe they had high noise levels, poor receivers,
> were listening on the wrong VFO or whatever -- but that seems to happen
> much more often on SSB than on CW.
>
> Just to reinforce (but not necessarily prove...) my point, a few minutes
> ago I tuned my K2 down to the lower part of 17M, heard a JK1 finish a QSO,
> gave him a call and he came right back to me. He was 559 and gave me 529 --
> and he copied my name, QTH and rig with no repeats. (Granted, the "1" call
> helps get the attention of Pacific Rim stations! :-)
>
> Someone claimed that CW has a 20dB advantage in S/N over SSB -- Fooie! The
> advantage is more in the range 6-9dB, but highly dependent on the receiver
> bandwidth.
>
> 72/73
> Larry W1HUE/7
>
> PS - I am also "technically competent" as demonstrated by my publications
> in various ham mags (mostly QRP) over the years. And I own more test
> equipment than just a RatShack DVM...
++++++++++++++++++
Reply-To:
From: "Ron D'Eau Claire"
To: "'George, W5YR'"
Cc:
Subject: RE: [Elecraft] SSB - Fooie!
Date: Tue, 8 Oct 2002 23:31:24 -0700
George, W5YR wrote:
I don't know where the 20 dB advantage figure for CW over SSB comes
from, but both Larry and I were around during the early days of the
AM/SSB wars. A number of analysis papers were published in all the ham
literature, but as I recall the consensus was that sideband offered an
overall 9 dB over DSB AM in terms of S/N and some intangibles like power
consumption, final amplifier efficiency, etc....
--------------------------
Ha! I had forgotten about the equations that included the final
amplifier efficiency (or supposed efficiency) back when virtually no Ham
had much of an idea how much power the rig put OUT, but only how much
power the final amplifiers CONSUMED! Your age is showing .
You are perfectly right, George. The advantage of one mode over another
is basically a difference in bandwidths, assuming no interference. What
is a workable bandwidth for any mode is largely up to the operator's
tastes. Some ops hate the sound of SSB with less than 3 kHz of audio
bandwidth. Others like 2 kHz. Some ops run their CW rigs at 200 Hz or so
bandwidth. Others (including me) tend to use 1 or ever 1.5 kHz unless
QRM forces me to narrow down the bandwidth.
Another variable with voice vs. CW is the fact that you must hear MORE
of the SSB to make sense of what is being said. With CW, you can QRS and
make out what is going on with very weak signals. There is a higher
degree of redundancy in the CW signal that allows more data to be lost
before the meaning is lost than with a voice. While it is theoretically
possible to hold a SSB QSO in which the stations spell every word
phonetically and repeat them, I suspect that it's a lot more common for
a CW operator to QSZ automatically when conditions are bad.
So the dB "advantage" of one mode over another includes a lot of
subjective operator choices.
If one wants an "absolute" statement that holds up under any conditions,
it is that CW can be read more easily by a skilled operator than SSB
under weak signal conditions. Beyond that it's a debate!
That said, I am not suggesting that it isn't possible to hold an SSB QSO
spanning the earth with a few milliwatts of RF. I am suggesting that it
will happen more often with a narrower-bandwidth mode like CW. Nothing
more.
Ron AC7AC
K2 # 1289
+++++++++++++++++
From: bejones at hursley.ibm.com
To: elecraft at mailman.qth.net
Date: Wed, 9 Oct 2002 09:53:09 +0100
Subject: RE: [Elecraft] SSB - Fooie!
> During the California QSO contest I worked 22 states and a few provinces all
> with less than 10w on SSB. I was trying for all states but I got into the
> game late. I only missed one try on 40m.a
During WAS over the last couple of years I worked in excess of 30
states each year (35 in 2001, don't have this year's log here). All 10W
SSB on a 102' doublet at 30'.
QRP SSB works very well in contests when the other guy will make the
effort for the extra point. It is much harder to have casual QSOs
though, as Larry points out some folks often don't want to be bothered
with much less than 59 copy.
One of the better QSOs I had was with a VK7GK in Tasmania who
switched of his linear to join me at 10W and we had a 44 copy QSO for
about 20 mins before I had to run. Nice to exceed 1000miles/watt with
a casual chat QSO.
One of these days I use the K2 for CW :-)
Brian G0UKB
K2 #1115
++++++++++++++
From: "Dan Barker"
To: "Elecraft"
Subject: FW: [Elecraft] SSB - Fooie!
Date: Wed, 9 Oct 2002 07:16:53 -0400
It wasn't my K2, and it wasn't on purpose (I had the drive all the way down
for tuneup, and just forgot when I heard a JA in Atlanta), but I once got a
439 report from over 10K Miles on 750 mW!
I was wondering why the poor report (he was pretty solid) so after the QSO I
saw the problem, and measured my output before turning up the wick.
When Mother Nature wants you to comminicate, you communicate. When she
doesn't, 10KW won't help.
Dan / WG4S / K2 #2456
BTW: That was CW.
++++++++++++++++
From: N2EY at aol.com
Date: Wed, 9 Oct 2002 07:47:45 EDT
Subject: Re: [Elecraft] SSB - Fooie!
To: rondec at easystreet.com, w5yr at att.net
Cc: Elecraft at mailman.qth.net
In a message dated 10/9/02 2:50:21 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
rondec at easystreet.com writes:
> The advantage of one mode over another
> is basically a difference in bandwidths, assuming no interference.
That's most of the difference. If we take SSB as needing 2500 Hz and CW as
needing 250 Hz, a lot of the improvement is obvious (less N means better S/N)
What's not so obvious is the fact that in many cases CW needs a lower S/N to
be readable. All you need to determine is whether the tone is there or not.
There are times when you can hear a voice signal, but can't make out what is
being said.
Also, CW has the advantage of being "fully voiced". IOW, the ratio of peak to
average power is much higher.
None of this means SSB or even AM is useless for QRP work. How many times
have we gotten 599 plus reports for QRP CW? Switching to SSB under those
conditions would have yielded reports of 579 or better.
73 de Jim, N2EY
++++++++++++++++
Date: Wed, 09 Oct 2002 09:23:14 -0500
From: "George, W5YR"
Organization: AT&T WorldNet Service
To: Dan Barker
Cc: Elecraft
Subject: Re: FW: [Elecraft] SSB - Fooie!
Not always, Dan! When Mother Nature wants you to comminicate, you communicate. When she
> doesn't, 10KW won't help.
++++++++++++++
From: "Ferguson, Kevin"
To: "'elecraft at mailman.qth.net'"
Date: Wed, 9 Oct 2002 08:38:38 -0600
Subject: [Elecraft] Re: SSB - Fooie!
The bandwidth considerations are correct, but there
is another, easy to understand, contributing factor:
The PEP to average power ratio for SSB is somewhere
around 10 dB. Yes, compression can lower that number,
by increasing the average value. Including more
bandwidth (thinking 80 M hifi types
here) can dramatically raise the ratio by increasing
the peaks. (multiple non-harmonicly related frequencys
will periodically add constructivly, producing higher
peaks think two-tone test with 10 tones instead!)
While keyed the peak to average ratio for
CW is close to 0 dB. (Exactly zero only if you permit nasty
clicks)
If only the peaks are loud enough to distinguish from the noise,
you can't understand voice, but you can copy CW. To understand
voice, the average needs to be a bit above the noise so that
most of the softer voice sounds also come through. (the receiving brain
can fill in some gaps if they are small enough)
Enter narrow bandwidth and compression, the SSB DXer's friends.
Anyway, between the bandwith considerations and the peak-average
differences, I think a 20 dB advantage for CW using the _same_ PA IS
a reasonable estimate. Compression might shave 3-4 dB off that number.
The only way I could get down to 9 dB were if I were only considering the
S-meter reading at the recieving end...and then I would say, that yes
you probably do need to see the S meter peaking 1-1/2 S units or so
above background for solid SSB copy, while it needn't move to copy CW.
But keep in mind that this background
noise is already around 10 dB higher due to the increased reciever
bandwidth.
++++++++++++++
Reply-To:
From: "Ron D'Eau Claire"
To:
Subject: RE: [Elecraft] SSB - Fooie!
Date: Wed, 9 Oct 2002 08:38:26 -0700
Brian G0UKB wrote
QRP SSB works very well in contests when the other guy will make the
effort for the extra point. It is much harder to have casual QSOs
though, as Larry points out some folks often don't want to be bothered
with much less than 59 copy.
------------------------
Maybe the K2 and the other QRP SSB rigs will change that. I recall in
decades past that a LOT of CW ops scoffed at anyone who didn't have an
S-9 signal. Oh, most ops tolerated a low powered signal at least long
enough to swap signal reports - I think that we were considered
"refugees" from the Novice bands who hadn't bought a "real rig" yet in
their opinion. But it was often hard to have a rag chew with some of
those ops. I don't think that is quite so true to day. The reason, I
suspect, is the popularity of QRP and the sheer number of QRP rigs on
the bands. I'm using QRP in it's generic meaning of "low power" and
including all of us running 10 or 20 watts with various rigs as well as
the QRP ARCI enthusiasts.
At the same time there haven't been all that many QRP rigs readily
available to the bulk of the SSB ops - at least not since the 20A and a
few other 10 and 20 watt PEP rigs disappeared from the market in the
early 1960's. Back then what "sold" the "Donald Duck modulation" to the
mainstream was the fact that 10 or 20 watts PEP got out just as well as
the bulk of the 50 to 150 watt (d-c input) AM stations on the air. And
that was what the vast majority of the "phone operators" were running in
those days.
But since the advent of the 'factory built' 100 watt output SSB rigs,
low powered SSB has been a bit like AM on the phone bands from what I
understand. A few dedicated enthusiasts but not much more.
Now when more and more QRO ops hear QRP ops having nice rag chews on
SSB, perhaps they'll begin to think a little differently about the need
for a "20 over 9" signal to have a nice QSO.
Ron AC7AC
K2 # 1289
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Date: Wed, 09 Oct 2002 12:03:09 -0400
From: "Mark J. Dulcey"
To: rondec at easystreet.com
Cc: elecraft at mailman.qth.net
Subject: Re: [Elecraft] SSB - Fooie!
Ron D'Eau Claire wrote:
>
> But since the advent of the 'factory built' 100 watt output SSB rigs,
> low powered SSB has been a bit like AM on the phone bands from what I
> understand. A few dedicated enthusiasts but not much more.
The HFPack group counts as more than "a few" dedicated enthusiasts; the group membership currently stands
at 2859. One way to look for low-power SSB QSOs is to visit 17 meters and go looking for those folks.
++++++++++++++++++
To: johnclif at ix.netcom.com, elecraft at mailman.qth.net
Date: Wed, 9 Oct 2002 08:54:43 -0700
Subject: Re: [Elecraft] SSB Distances...
From: k6se at juno.com
John, KD7KGX wrote:
"My best 'miles per watt' was talking from Seattle to the Yukon Territory
on 100mW (the K2 was turned down as far as it would go) and CW... about
600> miles according to my HamCall CD, or 6,000 miles/watt."
==========
The other morning W0AH had 555-mile and 590-mile QSOs on 160-meter CW
while running about 3/4 mw ERP -- both over 600,000 miles per watt!
73, de Earl, K6SE
+++++++++++++++++
To: rondec at easystreet.com, w5yr at att.net, Elecraft at mailman.qth.net
Date: Wed, 9 Oct 2002 09:04:09 -0700
Subject: Re: [Elecraft] SSB - Fooie!
From: k6se at juno.com
Ron, AC7AC
"Another variable with voice vs. CW is the fact that you must hear MORE
of the SSB to make sense of what is being said.'
==========
I think it is fair to allow 6 dB advantage to CW for the reason Ron gives
-- A CW signal just barely out of the noise can be 100% copy, while an
SSB signal at the same strength will be 0% copy.
That 6 dB, coupled with the S/N improvement that commonly-used 250 Hz
xtal filters offer clearly makes CW the big winner over SSB for copying
weak signals.
I don't know how this thread started, but what does the 9 dB advantage
that SSB has over AM have to do with CW ?
73, de Earl, K6SE
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